Wilder Boys

by Brandon Wallace

  “The sign on the front,” Taylor exclaimed. “It’s going to the Grand Tetons!”

  The coach was a tour bus, and the last of the passengers were getting off to stretch their legs

  “We gotta get on that bus,” Taylor hissed. “It’ll take us right to the park!”

  Jake’s heart thundered again, but his grin faltered.

  “They’re never going to let us on like this,” he told Taylor. “Look at our clothes.”

  “Maybe we can buy tickets,” Taylor said

  “Or maybe we don’t need tickets. . . . I’ve got an idea.”

  Jake led Taylor and Cody away from the bus.

  “Where are we going?” Taylor asked.

  “Shh. You’ll see.”

  The boys and Cody walked past some of the eighteen-wheelers, and then circled around behind the coach. Crouching behind a truck’s rear trailer, Jake spied on the bus. All the passengers appeared to have left to go into the truck stop, but he didn’t know if the driver was still on board. Then he saw a man in a gray uniform talking on a cell phone step off and wander toward the building.

  “C’mon. Quick!” Jake said.

  The boys ran up to the side of the bus, and Jake lifted the latch on one of the big luggage compartments above the undercarriage. The first compartment was locked, but the second one opened with a squeal.

  “We’re going to get in there?” Taylor asked.

  “Sharon said it’s only three hours up to the Tetons,” Jake said. “We ought to be okay.”

  “What if we get trapped?” Taylor asked.

  “We won’t!” Jake said impatiently. “Now, get in!”

  Looking doubtful, Taylor climbed in over a couple of suitcases to an empty space at the back of the compartment.

  “Cody, come!” Taylor called, and the terrier hopped in after him.

  Jake tossed his backpack to Taylor and crawled in on top of a duffel bag. With a last glance to make sure no one had seen them, he reached up and pulled down hard on the edge of the compartment door. It slammed shut, plunging them into darkness.

  The enclosed pitch-black space sent a shiver of fear through Jake—it couldn’t be more different from Sharon’s truck. The heavy diesel motor hummed, and the bus rumbled around them as it moved, jolting them up and down in the darkness.

  “Get the flashlight out of your pack,” Jake said.

  Jake heard Taylor rummaging around, and a moment later a dim yellowish light filled the compartment. The boys were on their way to the Grand Tetons, but it wasn’t exactly comfortable; not only was it dark, the luggage compartment soon became like a hot and sweaty sauna.

  “I’m thirsty,” Taylor said.

  “Me too,” Jake told him. “Did you refill your water bottle?”

  “No . . .”

  “Me neither.”

  First Rule, Jake scolded himself. Always make sure our water bottles are filled.

  “We’ll have to find something in this luggage,” Jake said.

  Jake knew that stealing was wrong, but right now he didn’t see that they had much choice. Already, sweat beaded up on his forehead, and he was feeling sick to his stomach. He imagined that Taylor felt the same way.

  The boys began opening the bags around them. In one suitcase, Jake found a map of Wyoming and stuffed it into his pack, but what they really needed now was water, and maybe some food.

  “Nothing here,” Taylor said, closing up a large plastic suitcase, grabbing on to it to regain his balance. It was so hot and stuffy, he was starting to feel dizzy.

  “Not here, either,” Jake said, moving on to another bag, when suddenly Taylor let out a cry.

  “Score!” Taylor whooped.

  Jake glanced over to see his brother pulling four granola bars and a bag of trail mix from a large blue-and-black backpack.

  Jake grinned. “Nice.”

  Then Taylor’s grin became even wider as he pulled out two unopened plastic bottles of water. “Jackpot!”

  The boys twisted off the caps of the bottles and began guzzling down the water like they were in the desert. Taylor tore open a granola bar. “You want one, Jake?”

  “Uh, maybe later.” The water helped, but Jake still felt queasy as the coach bumped and jerked along the road.

  The ride seemed to last forever, and the longer it lasted, the more worried the boys grew. Taylor’s questions just added to Jake’s growing anxiety.

  “Jake, what if the sign on the bus was wrong? What if this bus isn’t going to the Tetons at all? Maybe it just came from the Tetons, and we end up in Mexico or something?”

  “Taylor, this bus is not going to Mexico.”

  “But what if it is? Then, when we drive through the desert, we’ll be boiled alive! And what if we run out of air in here before the bus stops?”

  “Taylor—” Jake was getting exasperated, but before he could continue, the bus began to slow.

  “What’s happening?” Taylor asked.

  “We must be stopping. See, I told you we weren’t going to Mexico!” Jake laughed. Taylor just rolled his eyes and zipped up his backpack as the giant vehicle jerked to a halt with a loud hiss.

  “Where are we?” Taylor whispered.

  “I’m not sure, but wherever it is, we need to make a quick exit—the driver isn’t going to be happy when he opens that door!” Jake replied.

  The boys grabbed their packs and prepared to move as they heard footsteps overhead. Crouched and ready, they heard muffled voices outside, then suddenly a creaking swoosh as the luggage compartment door flew up and open. The boys gulped in the fresh air and shielded their eyes against the bright light. Cody barked and leaped out of the bus.

  “What the—?” a man exclaimed. The bus driver and several startled passengers stood staring at them.

  Jake and Taylor didn’t hang around to explain. “Thanks for the ride, mister!” Taylor said with a grin. “Are we in the Tetons?”

  The driver found his voice and demanded, “Yes, we’re in the Tetons, and who are you? What were you doing in there?”

  “Sorry, can’t stop!” Jake whooped, jumping down from the bus and pushing through the startled passengers. The boys sprinted away, the driver making a feeble attempt to stop them.

  “Hey, you kids! Get back here!” he shouted.

  But the boys ignored the shouts. Across the parking lot, Jake spotted a road and a line of trees behind it. This is our shot.

  “This way, Taylor. Go!”

  11 Jake finally slowed and came to a halt, his chest heaving. “Wait, Taylor. I don’t think they followed us. I think we can stop running!”

  They glanced behind them but saw no sign of the bus driver through the trees. Cody, who had dashed ahead, stopped and came trotting back. He cocked his head as if to say, Why’d you stop? That was fun!

  “You see the look on that guy’s face?” Taylor asked Jake, laughing.

  “Yeah! He looked like he’d seen a ghost—or two!”

  The boys emerged out of the patch of aspen trees and into a sun-splashed green meadow. Sage- and grass-covered hills rose in front of them. Behind that towered the spectacular snow-glazed peaks of the Grand Tetons themselves.

  “Wow!” exclaimed Taylor. “Jake, you ever seen mountains like those?”

  Jake took a deep breath of sage-scented air and studied the peaks. They seemed impossibly jagged and tall. “Only in books,” he replied, taking it all in.

  Right then both boys smelled campfire smoke. Taylor’s stomach rumbled. “Oh, man. I smell something good cookin’. Let’s go find where it’s coming from.”

  Taylor started in the direction of the smells, but his brother stopped him. “We gotta stay out of sight. You don’t want someone to report us and send us back to Bull, do you?”

  Fear flashed across Taylor’s face, and Jake regretted bringing up their mom’s boyfriend. “Come here,” he told his brother. “Let’s figure out where we are.”

  They plunked down on a nearby rock. Jake took out their father’s letter while Tayl
or spread out the map of Wyoming that they’d found in the bus compartment. Most of the map didn’t show enough detail to really help them, but Taylor located a close-up insert of Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks.

  Jake said, “Dad writes here something about seeing the aurora borealis, and leaving inspiration behind us.”

  “Huh? What’s inspiration?” Taylor asked. “What’s the aurora borealis?”

  “Well,” Jake said, waffling, “inspiration is something that, you know, inspires you.”

  “You mean, like, when you sweat?”

  Despite being hungry and tired, Jake laughed. “No, that’s perspire.”

  Taylor laughed too.

  “Inspire is when something makes you feel good about yourself,” Jake explained. “It makes you want to do better.”

  “Or be better.”

  Jake nodded. “Yeah. But I don’t know what aurora borealis is. It sounds familiar, but . . .”

  “What else does the letter say?” Taylor asked.

  “Well, there’s that thing about looking across the moose’s neck, but nothing that tells us which way to go.”

  “Look,” Taylor said, pointing to their new map. “Here’s something called Inspiration Point next to Jenny Lake. You think that’s what he meant when he said leaving inspiration behind?”

  Jake followed Taylor’s finger, and his heart beat faster. “That could be it. Let’s head toward it. It looks like it’s north of us on the map. You got the compass?”

  Taylor pulled the instrument from his pocket. Both boys knew how to use it from summer camp the previous year, and Taylor quickly located the right direction. “That way.”

  “Okay, let’s get farther away from the road, and then we can head north.”

  Cody didn’t need to be told twice. He dashed through the sagebrush, and the boys set out after him.

  They followed animal trails—the boys weren’t sure what kind—north and west for about a mile. After fifteen minutes they surprised a jackrabbit, standing tall, nose quivering, staring at them.

  “Jake!” Taylor shouted, but as soon as the word left his mouth, the rabbit spooked and bounded away on its long powerful legs. Cody tore after him.

  “Bring us some dinner, Cody!” Taylor yelled, but moments later the dog reappeared—without the rabbit in his mouth.

  “Well, I guess we know what’s making these trails through the brush.” Jake laughed.

  Half a mile farther, they intersected one of the park’s hiking trails. They turned right and followed it north to Taggart Lake. Although the Tetons rose steeply only a mile or two to their left, the trail undulated up and down through the hilly sage country. Sometimes it veered through lodgepole pines or aspen groves, but then it returned to the sagebrush, and before long the boys spotted a group of hikers getting closer to them.

  Jake’s eyes quickly sought a hiding place, but the sagebrush offered nothing.

  “What should we do?” Taylor hissed.

  “Just act natural, and let me do the talking,” Jake told him.

  Cody ran ahead to greet the hikers, a man and a woman carrying heavy day packs. The woman stopped to pet Cody as Jake and Taylor walked up to them.

  “Sorry about that,” Jake said. “He likes people.”

  “So cute!” the woman crooned. Cody basked in the attention.

  “How are you guys?” the man asked. The couple looked like they could be college students, or maybe a bit older.

  “Pretty good,” Jake responded. “How about you?” He didn’t want to get into a long conversation, but he figured he had to ask.

  “We’re great,” said the man. Waving at the towering Teton peaks, he then asked, “Who wouldn’t be great on a day like this? It’s your first time here?”

  “Uh, yeah,” Jake said.

  “Us too.”

  “This is the prettiest spot we’ve ever been,” the woman added, standing straight again. “Are you here alone?”

  Jake and Taylor quickly glanced at each other.

  “Oh, uh, our parents are waiting for us at the end of the trail.”

  The man nodded. “Well, be careful. The rangers said they’ve seen grizzlies around here.”

  “Really?” Taylor asked, fear edging his excitement.

  “That’s what they said. You have bear spray?”

  “Right in my pack,” Jake lied.

  “Well, you might want to carry it on your belt,” said the man. “If you see a bear, you won’t have time to pull it out.”

  “Okay. Thanks.”

  The boys said good-bye to the couple and continued hiking. When they were out of earshot, Jake sighed heavily. “Man, I didn’t like that. They asked a lot of questions.”

  “And what’s with the bears?” Taylor asked, a note of fear edging his voice. “I don’t like the sound of that!”

  “We have to be extra careful now that we’re out in the wild,” Jake said. “There are worse wild animals than Bull out here!”

  As they approached Bradley Lake, the boys decided to delve into their precious food supply. Jake chose a can of tuna fish, but by the time they shared it with Cody, they only felt hungrier. Searching through his pack, Jake discovered an even worse problem.

  “Uh-oh.”

  “What?” Taylor asked.

  “I think I’m out of water,” Jake replied.

  “That’s okay. We can share,” Taylor said, handing Jake his own water bottle.

  Jake smiled at his brother. “Thanks, but that’s not gonna last very long.”

  Taylor laughed and pointed to Bradley Lake. “But there’s water all over the place here.”

  “Yeah, but it’s probably dirty—we don’t wanna catch something!”

  Taylor nodded. “What can we do, then? I don’t see any drinking fountains around here.”

  “Well,” Jake said. “You remember at camp, they told us we should boil water to make it safe. Or put those little pills in it, or filter it.”

  “We don’t have any pills or a filter, do we?”

  Jake shook his head.

  “Well, then we can boil it when we make camp.”

  Jake nodded. “Yeah. Until then, we’re going to have to ration our supply.”

  “No problem,” said Taylor. “I’m part camel.”

  “In that case, you can give me a ride!” Jake said, pretending to hop up onto Taylor.

  The boys continued their trek to Bradley Lake, where the trail forked. One path led up into the mountains, and Jake longed to follow it, but he knew they weren’t ready to go so far off track. Besides, that trail would lead them away from their destination, Jenny Lake. Instead the boys turned right, down through more sagebrush and grass meadows.

  A riot of wildflowers soon surrounded them. Jake recognized many of the flowers from his father’s journal: the lavender-and-white blooms of lupine; the sun-splashed yellow flowers of arrowleaf balsamroot; purple shooting stars and larkspur and many more.

  “It’s so colorful here,” exclaimed Taylor. “Nothin’ like our place in Pennsylvania.”

  “Yeah, I can see why Dad wanted to come out here.”

  “I wish I remembered Dad better,” Taylor said. “What do you think he’ll be like?”

  “I don’t remember a whole lot myself,” Jake admitted. “He was big and had a long brown beard. He used to take us walking through the Pennsylvania woods all the time, looking for birds and mushrooms. He’d just toss you up on his shoulders and off we’d go.”

  “Was he nice? Nicer than Bull?”

  Jake snorted. “A crocodile’s nicer than Bull.”

  “Seriously, Jake.”

  “He was nice. You’ll like him.”

  Jake didn’t tell him about the fights he remembered. How his mother and father yelled at each other about work and money and their father’s plans to move out West. He also didn’t tell Taylor about the day their dad finally left. The day that had broken Jake’s heart forever.

  “Hey, look!” Taylor shouted, interrupting Jake’s thoug
hts.

  In the distance, maybe half a mile a way, a group of enormous brown rocks seemed to be sitting in a field. As Jake watched, one of the rocks began to move.

  “Bison!” Jake shouted.

  “Awesome!” Taylor yelled.

  Cody couldn’t tell what the boys were looking at, but he caught their excitement. He yipped and pranced around like a circus animal.

  Jake and Taylor cracked up.

  “It’s a good thing they aren’t any closer,” Taylor said. “Cody would start a stampede. Did you ever think we’d be seeing real live bison?”

  Jake shook his head. “Never even crossed my mind. Look at them! They’re something, aren’t they?”

  Amazed, the boys stood and watched the large mammals grazing.

  “C’mon,” Jake said. “Let’s keep going. Maybe we can get a better view of them.”

  They brushed through the long grass, Taylor leading the way, laughing as they approached the huge animals that loomed in the distance. But as they got closer to a small running stream, Taylor suddenly froze and gasped.

  Jake almost collided with him. “Hey! What gives?”

  His hand trembling, Taylor pointed at the ground. Jake’s eyes widened as he saw what had freaked Taylor out. There, in the middle of the trail, angry and menacing, was a snake. It was hissing and ready to strike!

  12 The snake’s jaws were wide open, exposing the red flesh of its mouth. Two-thirds of the serpent’s body lay coiled like a spring, ready to launch an attack. Suddenly Cody barked and moved toward the snake, snapping the boys into action.

  Taylor seized the dog by the scruff and dragged him away. “Cody, get back!”

  Jake also leaped back—almost tripping over a sage bush. When he straightened up, though, he peered at the snake more closely. After a moment he stepped closer.

  “Jake, what are you doing?” Taylor yelled.

  “Can you see its pupils?” Jake asked, peering at the snake.

  “No, and I don’t want to!” Taylor shouted.

  The snake hissed again, and Jake moved almost to within striking distance. The markings of the snake looked familiar, like something he’d read about in his dad’s journal.